
FOUR YEARS OF 



CAMP, 



MARCH and BATTLE 



A.N A.DD R ESS 



Delivered before Post No. 12, G. A. R., Washington, D. C. 



March 26th, 1870. 



By HON. JASPER PACKARD, M. 0. 



WASHINGTON, D. C. 
Gibson Brothers, Printers 

1870. 



FOUR YEABS OF 

CAMP, 
MAKCH and BATTLE 



Aln Address 



Delivered before Post No. 12, G. A. R., Washington, D. C. 
March 26th, 1870. 



By HON. JASPER PACKARD, M. C. 



WASHINGTON', U. C. 

Gibson Brothers, Printers, 

1870. 



Headquarters U. S. Grant Post, No. 12, 

Department of the Potomac, G. A. R., March 15, 1870. 

In accordance with an order from National Headquarters, directing that a 

member of the Post be detailed at each meeting to relate reminiscences of the late 

war, General Jasper Packard is hereby appointed to deliver an address before 

this Post on the 26th of .March, 1870. 

J. II. STINE, Commander. 



Headquarters U. S. Grant Post, No. 12, G. A. R., 

April 6, 1870. 

Sir: At a regular meeting of this Post, on last evening, resolutions adopting 
3 of Generals Packard and Shanks— delivered before the Post on the 
evening of the 26th of March, 1870 — were passed, and a request that the corn- 
Messrs. Packard and Shanks, please furnish this Post with a copy each of 
the same for publication. 

5 ours, in F., C. and L.. 

PHIL. T. SOUTH. 

Act ' g Adj't. 
To the Hon. Jasper Packard, M.C. 



A I)D \l ESS. 



Detailed by proper authority to recount to this Post of the Grand 
Army of the Republic my own army experience, I am here in obedi- 
ence to the order, and will give you, as briefly as I may, a sketch of 
those events, "all of which I saw, and part of which I was. " 

The dullest and most irksome period of a soldier's life is the time 
spent in the hist camp of the regiment. Camps of rendezvous are 
regarded as necessary evils, to be just tolerated until the first "march- 
ing orders" come. The departure is a day of rejoicing. The inces- 
sant " Left, " " Left, " gives place to the hurry of preparation. Shouts 
of joy are heard, and mirth and jollity reign in every row of barracks. 
The 48th Lid. A'ols. was no exception to the rule. 'There was an ex- 
cellent drill-ground in Camp Ellis, where the regiment was organized. 
and very faithfully were its advantages improved. Week in, week 
out, from four to six hours a day, Sundays -excepted, it was one un- 
varying succession of squad, company, and battalion drill — a ser- 
vice Avhich the soldier seldom fully appreciates until the battle-field 
shows him its utility. 

The men took hold of the work with considerable alacrity, but after 
awhile they began to clamor for a sight of the enemy. Our colors 
came from Indianapolis. They were greeted with hearty cheers, as 
in those days the flag always was,. for we had learned to love it then 
as we never did before. The guns of Sumter gave the Stars and 
Stripes a meaning and a beauty which it had not before entered into 
our hearts to conceive. Thus these new colors under which we W 
to right, and many were to die, that were to lead the regiment in the 
stern trials of the battle, oh ! how beautiful they were! Then the 
war fever grew apace. ( >nly to drill was too tame. Sterner work 
was needed ; and we were the boys to do it. At last, the welcome 
orders came, and when our gallant colonel inquired, " Forty-eighth, 
are you ready I " the lloosier shout that, went up in answer was not 
mere bravado, but indicated stern determination. 

It was a noble regiment that marched out of Camp Ellis on the 
7th day of February, 1862. Fathers, and sons, and husbands were 
there, all animated, tilled, and sublimed with the one great purpose lo 
s-iatch the nation from the grasp of traitors. For this they were 
ready to risk life itself. For this many of them did give up their 
lives, dying that the nation might live. 

We reached Cairo on tin' evening of the 8th of February, and 
that night received rations of " hard tack " for the first time. Few 

of us had ever Been thai article; but then, as through all the war, we 

found it very good to remove hunger, and sometimes teeth. Every- 
body knows Cairo; hut when we left the ears Sunday morning, and 



making our way through the mud, reached the old barracks vacated 
for our use, we had an intense desire to "know it no more forever" 
as Bpeedily as possible. The day was Sunday; but there did not 
aeem to be the slightest knowledge of it among the denizens of the 
place. They talked of "religious folks" as inhabitants of some 
other world. 

During the day it was rumored that we were to go to Fort Henry, 
and the very first intimation of it was received with shouts of joy. 
Then it was said the 48th would stop at Paducah, being still un- 
armed. But anything for a change from those filthy barracks. The 
boys had no wish to receive their bounty land just then in the form 
of Cairo mud applied to their shoes. Night came at last, our first 
and last night in camp at Cairo, and the question of lodgings arose. 
There was no floor in the shanties, and the straw that was in the 
bunks was evidently populous enough already. 1 was sitting on a 
cracker-box — another patience on another monument — contemplating 
the circumstances, when I was startled out of due propriety by the 
sudden entrance of a large bale of straw. I was not in a mood to 
ask whence it came; and it was soon spread out, making nice clean 
lodgings for a company. At midnight came orders to take a steamer 
for Paducah, where we landed the next day. Here we received 
tents, and in a few days guns ; but straw, straw for beds, was not to 
be had ; and we soon learned, to our surprise, that it was an article 
not furnished to soldiers in the field. The ground was tiied ; but the 
nights being cold, morning found our blankets frozen fast to the 
ground. Then boards were pressed into the service. We bad all 
heard of the " soft side of a board ;" but that particular side we were 
unable to find. There was a strong contest every night between 
bones and board, in which board was usually victorious. 

These were the days when the meaning of " soldiering," as a tech- 
nical term, had not been learned. The soldier did not then know that 
he could sleep comfortably on two rails, or on the ground, if only it 
was dry enough, with his rubber blanket under him and his woollen 
one for a covering when it was clear and cool, reversing the position 
of the blankets when a rain came on in the night. The officer who 
inquired if his regiment had to camp there in the field, " out of doors,'" 
soon learned that houses or barracks were a luxury not ready at 
" day's march" distance, and that if they had been, they would have 
been repudiated as nuisances. There is no other couch so sweet, or 
sleeping so grand, as to lie down on pine branches under a sweet-gum 
tree, with the stars winking at you through the branches and the 
brilliant Southern moonlight trickling over you in fantastic paintings, 
changing with the rustling of the leaves above. This is the very cream 
of sleep. Feather beds and houses are skimmed milk compared to 
it. It refreshes and invigorates, and when you awake you are wide 
awake, and ready to spring at once into your boots and blouse. 

Fort Henry had fallen, and Donelson as well. The sun of Shiloh 
had set in blood. Pope's army of the Mississippi had been recalled 
from its operations on the Mississippi river, where it had won sub- 



Btantial victories. Day after day the blue boat-loads passed up the 
river, and it was known that " marching orders " would soon come to 
the regiments that had been for some weeks stationed at Paducah. 
They were soon on the move, and when the vessels which bore them 
swung out into the Ohio, and steamed up into the Tennessee, " tin- 
sounding aisles of the dim woods rang " with the shouts of soldier 
boys " spoiling for a tight." They thought they were going into one ; 
but the army was only moving on Corinth, and it continued this very 
laudable and exhilarating exercise until Beauregard slipped off with 
his army, leaving only the dull roar of an exploding magazine and a 
heavy column of smoke to tell the story of his departure. 

A dull summer followed, the gloomy summer of 1S62, when " all 
was quiet " on the Potomac ; when rebel corn and pork was protected 
by the bayonets of hungry soldiers ; when the dark-hued fugitive from 
bondage was hunted through our camps by his rebel master: when 
" fires were kindled in the rear; " when enlistments were discouraged ; 
when soldiers were urged to desert; when men followed the army 
with offers of money enough to pay expenses home, if the soldier 
would turn his back on the Hag. Few were found to do it, and thei/ 
are not among the members of the Grand Army of the Republic. 

All summer long the boys " spoiled for a fight," and on the 19th of 
September they were cured. They had a sharp little fight at Iuka, 
and though they often after that marched steadily into battle, they 
never " spoiled " again. It was a severe introduction to the perils 
of battle, for one-third our number had fallen, thirty-nine of them 
shot dead on the field. Two weeks after came the two-days' fight at 
Corinth, and a long and tedious march after a broken and fleeing 
enemy. There was some gallant fighting at Corinth, and among 
many others who won honor on those two days was that colonel of an 
Iowa regiment who is our present Secretary of War. Fighting like 
a Paladin of old, he seized a rebel colonel by the coat collar, and with 
his powerful arm drew him by main force through an embrasure, a 
prisoner at his feet. There was another encounter on the second 
day, a hand-to-hand conflict, which will never go into history unless , 
I embalm it lure. In my own company there was a Frenchman, who 
was always, when a little excited, rather careless in the use of his 
rifle. While hotly engaged in the fight, loading and firing with all 
due rapidity, he shot away the rammer from the musket of the soldier 
in his front. Immediately, but very coolly, the latter turned upon 
him ; both lay down their guns and took three or four rounds full in 
the lace of each, more after the style of the prize ring than the tactics 
of the battle-field. Their honor satisfied, the next moment the}* were 
in the ranks, firing away as steadily as ever, the missing rammer being 
replaced from the gun of a dead soldier lying near. 

The army now began to see and hear more of Grant. Halleck 
was gone : whither it mattered little, and little the soldiers cared. 
Etosecrans had been sent to command the Army of the Cumberland ; 
and Grant commanded the District of West Tennessee, with a col- 
umn that was to move down the Mississippi Central railroad and fiud 



6 

the rear of Vicksburg. That army remembered Donelsorj, and, with 

Grant for its immediate commander, felt higher confidence than ever 
before. It moved on to the Tallahatchie, forced the passage of that 
stream, passed through Holly Springs, and to and beyond Oxford. 
Grenada would soon have been reached, and Vicksburg might have 
fallen many months before it did, had it not been for the criminal 
negligence, to use no harsher term, of a subordinate at Holly Springs, 
who permitted the rebel general Van Dorn to lead a small column of 
cavalry into the place, capture the garrison, and destroy the immense 
stores of provisions upon which the army was to subsist while it left 
still further behind its base of supplies. With the railroad broken 
up to the north of the army, and all its provisions burned to ashes, a 
retrograde movement to the line of the Memphis and Charleston rail- 
road became a necessity. The army, except one division, moved 
back to that line. The. division excepted guarded a train of 1,200 
wagons to Memphis, where they were loaded with rations and taken 
eastward to the army, which had been living several days on half 
rations. 

The first effort to gain Vicksburg had failed; but that city was 
doomed. The quiet man who smoked his cigar in silence, and who 
'•moved on the works" of the enemy at Fort Donelson so grandly, 
had determined to go there. It was the objective point that must be 
reached, and there was no power on earth to prevent. The problem 
was to reach Vicksburg from the rear. But how 1 The gunboats 
had been driven away from the river front; Sherman's attack on 
Haines' Bluff had been repulsed, and the Holly Springs disaster had 
drawn back the army from the line of the Mississippi Central rail- 
road. But these apparent failures only stimulated to new expedients. 
Vicksburg must be reached from the rear, and Vicksburg must fall. 
So the troops began to embark on steamers and move down the river. 
Some were landed at Lake Providence, seventy miles above Vicks- 
burg, on the Louisiana side, designed to open a passage by means of 
lakes and bayous to the Red river, by which the Mississippi could be 
again reached four hundred miles below. Some landed at Young's 
Point, and engaged in the attempt to divert the current of the mighty 
river by cutting a canal across the peninsula in front of Vicksburg. 
Some landed at Milliken's Bend, ready to march across the country 
to some point far below, then cross the river, and reach Vicksburg 
from the South and East. 

There was also planned an expedition which promised Bliccess, 
which, designed at first only for the destruction of the rebel gunboats 
in the Yazoo river, was afterwards thought of as a route by which to 
place the whole army on the heights above Haines' Bluff, and thus 
secure the speedy downfall of Vicksburg. A short distance east of 
the river, and nearly opposite Helena, lay Moon lake, formerly, no 
doubt, a channel of the river. This could be reached in light-draught 
steamers by cutting the levee. From Moon lake it was possible, by 
moving inland through a narrow and tortuous pass, to reach the 
Cold Water river, which flows into the Tallahatchie, and this again 



into the Yazoo, or, perhaps, more correctly, in connection with the 
Yallabusha, it forms the Yazoo, as the Allegheny and Monongahela, 
flowing together, make the Ohio. Small light steamers were pro- 
cured, and Ross' division was sent through the pass, and two of the 
iron-dads; but there had been, of necessity, much delay. Then- 
was fallen timber to be cleared out. Cameron had been sent in with 
a brigade to do the work. It was slow, tedious, and laborious — 
working, wading, and fighting. It required many days of the severest 
and hardest kind of toil. Then, it was difficult to procure the ne< 
sary boats ; and when at last all was ready, the enemy was found to 
have made extensive preparation to meet our troops. Ross found the 
rebels well fortified at the junction of the Tallahatchie and the Yalla- 
busha. The ironclads attacked the fort, but were driven off. 1 1 
was unapproachable by land, and it effectually closed the passage for 
vessels. Ross turned about to move back to Helena, but the division 
of Quimby was then on it way. They met in the Cold Water river, 
and Quimby being the ranking officer, he took command and moved 
down again to Fort Pemberton, hoping that, with the additional forces 
and some siege guns, he would be able to clear the passage. 

This Yazoo Pass expedition was one of the most romantic events 
of the war. The Pass from Moon lake to the Cold Water river was 
very narrow, scarcely wider than the boats themselves, and so crooked 
that it was impossible to guide a vessel by its rudder. The yawls 
were out continually ; the boat's crew carrying a rope to a tree on 
the bank, making it fast, and then, by means of a windlass on board 
run by steam, drawing the vessel forward. Thus the fleet was worked 
along. The trees hung over the stream on either side, their branches 
raking the sides of the vessels and tearing away all the light work. 
In many instances huge limbs of trees had to be chopped away by 
the soldiers standing on the upper deck. Often several vessels of the 
fleet were in sight at the same time, but at no time, as they were seen 
through the trees, was it possible to tell whether they were before or 
behind, so crooked was the channel ; and so narrow was it that it 
seemed as if the vessels were being pushed over dry laud while they 
worked their way through the cotton woods on either side. To add 
zest to the daily entertainment, guerrillas infested the bank-. One 
morning, at daylight, when the men had just arisen, a volley was 
poured into the transport, Lady Jackson, from logs and trees on the 
bank. Hastily the men seized their guns, and returning the fire, the 
rebels disappeared. Only one soldier showed the white feather; and 
it is singular that no one but him was struck. He dodged to the 
furthest side of the vessel and lay down on the deck. A ball passed 
in at the window, and Hying clear through the vessel, across the cabin, 
and out at the opposite window or skylight, it passed into his body. 
and inflicted a wound from which he died a few d.iys alter. ]>ut the 
expedition was fruitless. The enemy had had time to re-enforce heavily, 
and it was found impracticable to reduce the fort, around which it was 
impossible to pass. The troops reluctantly re-embarked, and picked 
their slow ami toilsome way back to Helena, but nut to remain there 



any longer than was necessary to replace the torn and battered and 
disabled vessels which had been through the Pass, and then move to 
the vicinity of Vicksburg, 

The main army was now at Milliken's Bend, and General Grant 
was there in person. His presence always inspired confidence, and 
all now possessed an undoubting faith that work was to be done which 
would quicken the pulse and send the shout of joy leaping to the lips 
of loyalty all over the North. The canal across the peninsula, which 
at one time promised a degree of success, had proved a failure by 
reason of the fall of the water in the river; the inland experiments, 
by which it was hoped troops might be thrown below and thence to 
the rear of the citadel, were found to be impracticable. The troops 
must go below the Vicksburg and Warrenton batteries. This they 
could do by marching inland through Louisiana ; but how should they 
cross ? Vessels and barges must run past the batteries, and be ready 
to ferry over the troops when the muddy march should be completed. 
So transports, barges, and gunboats were selected, clad with hay and 
cotton bales, loaded with rations and ammunition, manned with sol- 
diers who volunteered from the ranks of the army, and when all was 
ready, they moved cautiously down upon the batteries to run that 
terrible gauntlet of death. Every heart in that army beat faster when 
the first guns of the upper batteries opened on those devoted vessels. 
They moved right on in the face of hurtling shot and shell, rounded 
the point, and passed down in front of the tremendous batteries that 
had withstood all the attacks of our iron-clads. The deep and con- 
tinuous thunder of the guns told the whole army of the mortal peril 
of the men on those vessels. The Mississippi in front of Vicksburg 
is crowded between comparatively narrow banks, and the rebels, set- 
ting fire to some frame houses on the river bank, lighted up the entire 
width- of the stream. One vessel was sunk; another caught fire and 
burned to the water's edge ; but most of them emerged from that gate- 
way of death. They had yet to pass the batteries at Warrenton and 
Grand Gulf. But the perilous descent was made at last, and when 
the army had moved across the country and struck the river at Bruins- 
burg, below Graud Gulf, the means of crossing were at hand. 

Then began a movement which, for daring and skill, is not sur- 
passed, if equalled, in the annals of war. This was the first great 
experiment of cutting loose from the base of supplies. It Mas not 
strange that the President, Mr. Lincoln, should have supposed Grant 
was making a mistake, nor was it strange that his noble nature im- 
pelled him afterwards to say to the General, " You were right, and I 
was wrong." The two corps-commanders whom General Grant most 
trusted, Sherman and McPherson, did not approve his plans, but, with 
the true spirit of the soldier, they co-operated as cheerfully as though 
the plan had been their own, and, with a grand generosity, afterwards 
voluntarily acknowledged that their chief was right. 

While the 17th corps, commanded then by McPherson, was crossing 
the river at Bruinsburg, the guns in advance told ns that the 13th 
corps was engaged. The 17th corps, and this is the one whose 



9 

movements I must now follow, met the enemy at Raymond, Logan's 
division leading, drove him flying from our front, pressed on to Jack- 
son, hurled him across Pearl river, and occupied the capital. It was 
a Napoleonic stroke, dividing and beating in detail, that sent one 
rebel army, under Johnston, broken and flying before our blue army, 
and then, turning, struck Pemberton at Champion's Hill, and sent him 
headlong into Vicksburg. Our troops lay in Jackson but one night ; 
and, turning directly back, moved rapidly westward. The Mobile 
papers stated the next day that Grant had retreated in the direction 
of Vicksburg ! Two days afterwards the rebel Pemberton concluded 
Grant was not retreating, but finding a retreat very necessary on the 
part, of some one, he played that rule himself. 

The bloody day and crowning victory at Champion's Hill enabled 
our army to shut up Vicksburg — that stronghold whose downfall 
would allow the father of waters to pass unvexed to the sea. It waa 
here, between Jackson and Vicksburg, that the men of the North 
hewed their way to the Gulf. 

On the 19th of May, the army closed in around the city. Haines' 
Bluff was evacuated by the rebels ; our transports passed up the 
Yazoo river, bearing provisions to the army, and a new base of sup- 
plies was established. Then the doom of the Confederacy was 
sealed. Then the gallant soldier, now the General of the Army, said 
to Grant, " This is indeed a campaign." 

1 cannot dwell on that terrible 22d of May, nor on the long and 
weary siege, extending to the 4th day of July, 1863, when our vic- 
torious banner waved triumphantly over more than 30,000 captive 
rebels. They say our President does not make speeches ; but ac- 
cording to the books, persuasion marks the gifted orator. Here was 
oratory that persuaded 30,000 men to stack their arms, and leave 
t hem-elves and their guns in our possession. 

On this same 4th of July, the most glorious anniversary of our 
history, the Union prisoners in Libby improvised a flag of such 
coarse material as they could strip from the rags which covered 
them, and fastened it over their heads in observance of our natal day. 
The keeper of the prison discovered the hostile emblem, and ordered 
the prisoners to take it down. No one spoke, and not a man stirred. 
lie ordered them again to take it down ; but he saw on every counte- 
nance an expression which said, "We can die on the battle-field ; we 
may be shot down here, defenceless as we are ; we may even meel 
the horrors of slow starvation ; but we will not pull down our coun- 
try's flag." Angrily he rushed forward, and snatched it from its 
place : but in that self-same hour the rebel rag came down at Vicks- 
burg, and the Stripes and Stars floated over it in victory. Could the 
rebel prison-keeper have seen that sight on the Mississippi, it might 
have stayed his traitor hand. 

News came one day toward the close of September, the sad new-. 
that Rosecrana had suffered a reverse near Chattanooga ; and, as 
usual, the reports came greatly exaggerated. Re-enforcements were 
needed, and they must go at once. Sherman was directed to mo\ e 



10 

to Memphis with the 1.5th corps, hut to leave behind one of his di- 
visions, and replace it with a division from the 17th corps; and this 
change makes it necessary for me to follow now the loth corps on 
transports to Memphis, on the cars thence to Corinth, and then on 
foot eastward, performing one of the longest marches of the war, to 
the ncighhorhood of Chattanooga. 

The day previous to the commencement of the fighting, Sherman's 
troops lay on the north side of the Tennessee river, hid away among 
the hills, from whose tops the rebel camps were in full view, almost 
encircling the town. At midnight, after the first day's fighting, 
Sherman's men left their camps, moved silently up the river to the 
place designated for the passage across, and ferried over in the pon- 
toon boats, which some hours after were supporting a bridge on which 
wagons and artillery and cavalry were freely crossing. As daylight 
dawned, a heavy fog completely enveloped the troops, effectually 
concealing all their movements. A log-house stood just in front of 
our line, and the inhabitants having just arisen, suddenly found them- 
selves surrounded by the Yankee army. It Avas a surprise party, 
more unexpected but less welcome than those parties usually are. 

From away down the river came the roar of Hooker's guns around 
Lookout Mountain, while Sherman's Vicksburg veterans, forming the 
extreme left of the army, moved quietly across the bottom-lands 
to the foot of the ridge, and gaining the crest, lay down to sleep, con- 
scious that the next day would bring bloody work. That night there 
was an eclipse of the moon, and some superstitious minds thought it 
was an omen of ill ; but the next day proved that if so, it was pointed 
at treason and not at loyalty. 

The night before a battle ! Then come trooping over the soul 
thoughts of home and all its tender joys. Wife and little ones ; they 
come around you then, and are drawn closer into your heart than ever 
before. Will you ever see them again ? The morrow will auswer. 
And you lift, perhaps, your first prayer to the good All-Father, close 
your eyes on the stars, and in dreams continue your waking thoughts. 
Here is the test of the soldier; not in the rush and roar of battle, 
but in the quiet night which precedes, when you are alone under the 
starry sky, with thousands lying around you, yet none the. less alone. 

The next day it thundered all around the sky. Left, right, and 
centre of our army, all were engaged. Sherman's persistent attack 
compelled Bragg to reinforce his right. Thus he weakened his centre, 
when Thomas hurled the Army of the Cumberland upon him, broke 
his line, and gained the crest of Mission Ridge. The battle was over, 
hut night was falling, and Bragg fled under its cover. This was in 
November, 1S63; and I must now transfer you to the army of the 
Ohio, commanded by General Schofield in May, 1864. 

For myself, I was now connected with the 12Sth Indiana regiment, 
which was assigned to Hovey's division, of the 23d corps, joining the 
other two divisions at Charleston, East Tennessee, after a long march 
from Nashville. 

Early in May, 18G4, Sherman commenced his great move on Atlanta, 



11 

his moving column consisting of the three armies of the Ohio, Cum- 
berland, and Tennessee. Flanking Dalton, Georgia, by moving 
through Snake Creek Gap, the enemy was drawn out of that place, 
and risking battle at Resaca, was terribly punished and pushed further 
back towards Atlanta. Then commenced that long battle, when for 
more than one hundred daya the troops were under fire. Many a 
soldier will recall the familiar names of Buzzard Roost and Rocky 
Face, and will remember the passage of the Oostenaula, the concen- 
tration of the army for more vigorous work at Kingston and Cassville, 
and afterwards, crossing the Etowah, the advance on Lost Mountain 
and Kenesaw and Marietta. Xext came the crossing of the Chatta- 
hoochie, marked alike by brilliant strategy in plan and skilfulness in 
execution. A reorganization of the divisions of the 23d corps had 
given me the privilege of following as division commander our present 
Secretary of the Interior, and it was his division that had the post of 
honor in the passage. The celerity and skill with which the enter- 
prise was effected was such that the whole 23d corps, led by Schofield, 
was across the river and firmly entrenched ou the heights, while yet 
the whole attention of the rebel Johnston was centered on the mass of 
our army, which lay several miles below. Then came the closing-in 
upon Atlanta. On the 20th day of July the city was in sight from 
many parts of the line. There was an interval of some distance be 
tween the left of the Army of the Ohio and the right of the Army of 
the Tennessee. The 128th Indiana was directed to move through 
the woods and find McPherson's right. Throwing skirmishers in 
advance and on the flank, it moved cautiously through the thick un- 
dergrowth, and at length emerged upon a road up which a short 
distance the rebel pickets were discovered, but no Army of the Ten- 
nessee was to be seen. There was still a space of a mile. Just then 
three or four cavalrymen of McPherson's body-guard appeared in the 
road. Riding rapidly with them, under the fire of the rebel pickets, 
to that General's headquarters, Sehofield's position was reported, and 
in five minutes a brigade was moving out to fill up the gap. In less 
than half an hour the junction was complete, and the whole army 
looked for the speedy downfall of Atlanta. During the night of the 
21st, Hood, then in command of the rebel army, withdrew a portion 
of his line and concentrated on the Army of the Tennessee, attacking 
on the 22d most fiercely and obstinately. On this day McPhcrson 
fell — McPherson, the skilful general, the brave and gallant gentleman, 
the Bayard of the American army, " without fear and without re- 
proach." Cox's division of the 23d corps was hurried rapidly to the 
left ; the day was won. But when night fell there was many a sad 
heart among the victors. " McPherson is dead " were the sad words 
that passed from lip to lip, and the tear-drop glistened in many an 
eye that was not used to weep. No commander was ever more be- 
loved than he, and we realized that day as never before the tremendous 
cost of the war. 

And now the days of July were spent, and those of August came 
on. In front, and in full view, lay the city of Atlanta. But the 



12 

rebel army lay between, and there was fighting yet to be done. It 
was a dark hour for the Confederacy. Grant had driven Lee back, 
step by step, and was now holding him as in a vice in his entrench- 
ments around Richmond and Petersburg ; Sherman, with the veteran 
legions of the West, had driven back the soldiers of Johnston and 
Hood from Dalton, from llesaca, from Kenesaw, from Peach Tree 
Creek, back into the " last ditch " before Atlanta. A fearful gloom 
overspread the prospects of the Confederacy. It must soon have 
yielded to the power of the national arms, when suddenly the rebels 
beheld a great light in the North, and they aroused themselves to a 
renewal of the conflict. A convention met at Chicago, a convention 
representing a large portion of the people, and after bitterly denouncing 
the Government and the war, and the soldiery engaged in the work 
of maintaining the nation, it published to the world the cowardly 
declaration, that the war having failed, it demanded an immediate 
cessation of hostilities. While one victory after another was crown- 
ing our arms all over the South, at Chicago a national convention 
hoisted the white flag. Oh, how that disgraceful surrender went to 
the hearts of our brave men, standing yonder in the smoke and thunder 
of battle ! No wonder there came up the indignant response : 

"What ! hoist the white flag when our triumph is nigh? 
What ! crouch before Treason, make Freedom a lie? 
What ! spike all our guns when the foe is at bay, 
And the rags of his black banner dropping away ? 
Tear down the strong name that our nation has won, 
And strike her brave bird from his home in the sun ? 

'■ He's a coward who shrinks from the lift of the sword : 
He's a traitor who mocks at the sacrifice poured. 
Nameless and homeless the doom that should blast 
The wretch who stands idly till peril is past. 
But he who submits when the thunders have burst, 
And victory dawns, is of cowards the worst." 

It is an encouraging sign of the times that the members of that 
convention are all extinct. There is no man in the country now who 
opposed the war; not one. They have all passed away, and none 
remain but those who were steadfast and true to the nation from the 
beginning to the end of the war. There was no platform of sur- 
render ; no discouraging of enlistments ; no calling of such names a? 
" Lincoln hirelings" and "Abolition war ;" no organizations of Knights 
of the Golden Circle and Sons of Liberty ; no resistance to the draft ; 
"no dying on one's own door-step ;" no sympathy for the South ; no 
rejoicing over rebel victories; and no sorrow when victory crowned 
the arms of the Union. Oh, no ! there was nothing of this kind. 
This was all the dream of a distempered imagination; a hallucination 
of the brain, having no existence in reality. If such men holding 
such views had lived so short a time ago, some of them would still be 
alive, and would tell us all about it. Or is it not possible that they 
fortified in the wrong direction, and have quietly climbed over the 
parapet and pointed their guns the other way ? 



14 

and broken, were driven from the State. There was no longer a 
good " killing " left, and as an organized army it never reappeared. 
Will yon follow ns now from Columbia west to the Tennessee river ; 
then on transports to Paducah, up the Ohio to Cincinnati ; on cars 
across the State of Ohio in a cold and wintry February to Benwood, 
and east on the Baltimore and Ohio railroad to Washington ; thence 
to Fort Fisher, back to Moorehead city, up the railroad to New Berne 
and Kinston, repairing the road much of the way; through our last 
battle at Kinston ; then on to Goldsboro', where we met the legions 
who had marched to the sea, and thence to Raleigh, to receive the 
surrender of the last rebel army. 

Here my narrative must end, though my own term of service did 
not close until a year after the surrender of Johnston. Many things 
of the highest personal interest to me I have omitted to mention, lest 
1 should subject myself to the charge of egotism. 

It would be pleasant to linger on many of the scenes I have so 
hastily sketched, but my time is too nearly spent to permit it, or even 
to stop long enough to portray the wild tumult of joy, when the news 
came to us on our march to Raleigh that Grant had made good his 
words, and had " fought it out on that line ;" that Lee had laid down 
his arms, and that peace had come " to stay." 

Before I close, I want to say a word or two in behalf of the rank 
and file of that grand army which marched up the avenue on its return 
from its conquering mission of peace, and soon melted from the sight 
of the nation. The enlisted men of our volunteer army formed the 
grandest body of men that ever assembled. From every pursuit of 
life they came — these unselfish, patriotic heroes. No motive but that 
of country could actuate the private soldier. He could scarcely look 
for promotion ; his name was seldom mentioned in general orders ; yet 
he stood as firmly for the flag and the honor of his country as if his 
name was to be spread over a continent. He endured hardships, 
wounds, disease, and death, and no regret ever fell from him that he 
left his home to serve his country. 'When we think of peace, and re- 
joice that the boon has come to us, do not forget that it was purchased 
in large measure by the " heroes of the rank and file." I saw these 
heroes falling, one by one, during the four years of war. Sometimes 
the minie ball crashed through skull and brain ; sometimes a lingering 
wound bore the brave young boy to a soldier's grave ; sometimes 
disease crept insidiously on, and he " slept the sleep that 
knows no waking." Sacred in the sight of the nation should 
be the death of these patriots and martyrs. Let not the dead or 
the living ever be forgotten. Let the orphan children of the deceased 
be nurtured with tenderest care ; though I need not commend this 
to you, of the Grand Army of the Republic, it being one of the lead- 
ing objects of your organization. In this work the loyal women of 
the United States will gladly share. We remember with lasting 
gratitude how the women of the nation, bright angels of mercy, stood 
by us, holding up our hands in the fearful struggle Many and many 
a sick and wounded soldier owes his life to their careful nursing 



13 

During the Atlanta campaign I came upon a man whose house had 
been placed, by the fortunes of war, between the two contending 
armies, the line of rebel works passing through his door-yard. To 
save himself and family he constructed a pit in the ground, throwing 
out the dirt towards the " blue coats," and leaving the opening in the 
direction of the " greybacks." But a day or two after his bomb- 
proof was completed, our army made an advance, drove back the 
enemy, and occupied the rebel works. And now the bomb-proof was 
useless. Every shot the rebels fired at us was liable to drop into the 
mouth of the poor man's cave. His fancied protection might prove 
his destruction, unless he changed the direction of his earthwork. 
And so there may be those who, having learned that to sit behind 
the rifle-pits of disloyally did not shield them from the wrath of an 
indignant people, have determined to jump over on to the side of loy- 
alty, and deny that they ever dug the pits or sat behind them. 

One day, near the close of August, the whole army let go, and 
marched rapidly away to the right. The citizens of Atlanta thought 
Sherman had retreated, and that night there was great rejoicing in 
Atlanta. Hood had sent, all his cavalry northward to cut the rail- 
road, and this gave Sherman his opportunity. At once he moved for 
the railroads behind Atlanta. The rebel cavalry on our road was 
only a fly, which did not " bother" Sherman in the least, and which 
he did not wish to brush away. Swinging slowly around, like the 
spoke of a huge wheel, the army reached the railroad, and broke it 
up for many miles. But Hood had learned that Sherman had not 
retreated, and, like Pemberton, he thought it best to do that part of 
the work himself. Hastily destroying what could not be removed, 
he withdrew to Jonesboro', where he offered battle, and received a 
severe chastisement. Not long did the army rest, for Hood soon 
moved northward, and Sherman thought best to escort him part of 
the way. He did so through Rome, Georgia, and as far as Gayles- 
ville, Alabama. Then seeing Hood turning northward, and believing 
he would march on Nashville, Sherman prepared to execute that mag- 
nificent march which surpasses the famous march of Marlborough 
from the Low Countries to Blenheim. 

The army was now divided, and some of us parted from our leader 
to meet him again at Goldsboro', North Carolina ; but Thomas and 
Schofield and Cox remained with us who moved to the north. At 
Pulaski we waited for Hood to cross the Tennessee ; then Schofield 
moved back to Columbia just in time to head off Hood's advance. 
Delays are sometimes dangerous ; but the proverb did not apply in 
this instance. Delay was just what Thomas wanted, who was in 
Nashville collecting our scattered forces. The enemy was held at 
Columbia nearly a week. Then followed the battle of Franklin, on 
the 30th day of November, when the rebels were so terribly shat- 
tered that Hood's army never recovered from the shock. The two 
days' fight at Nashville followed with their crowning victory, and 
then the vigorous pursuit through winter storm and rain, until Hood, 
and his proud rebel army, crushed, mangled and bleeding, dispirited 



15 

and the delicacies which their tender hands supplied. They forgot 
ease, and gave themselves to days of toil and nights of weariness that 
they might give the soldier what the Government could not furnish. 
Their labors of love warmed, fed, and clothed the soldier. They did 
more; they nerved our arms and cheered our hearts, and strengthened 
us for the toils of the march and the stern trials of the battle. Much 
of the glory the nation won in the contest is due to her daughters; 
and, for one, I say, should 1 ever forget their self-sacrificing 
devotion in the dark and dreadful day of the nation, may my right 
hand forget her cunning and my tongue cleave to the roof of my 
mouth. America is a grander nation to-day for what her women 
have done, and every man in the nation is better for their noble deeds. 
Woman — woman all over this land was a sister of mercy, whose ben- 
efactions carried joy to many a toil-worn soldier; whose hands were 
hi retched forth in blessing; whose feet were swift to run to the relief 
of the suffering, and who gave day and night unceasingly to her 
grand mission of humanity. Better far, and grander, is the laurel 
wreath that crowns her brow than the "costliest diadem that ever 
sparkled on the hea 1 of royalty ;" surer and clearer is her title to fame 
than though, through carnage and woe, she had hewed her way to a 
throne or conquered a world. 

Comrades, when an army of a million men was to be mustered out 
grave fears were entertained that if this immense body of men were 
thrown suddenly into civil life, social disorders would ensue. But 
these fears proved groundless. That army disappeared peacefully 
and quietly; yet it still exists. Its elements remain, and would flow 
readily together, should the necessities of the nation require. Here 
1 see the safety of the nation — her strong defence against her enemies. 
This safety and defence repose in her soldier-citizens, who, as a citizen 
soldiery, smote down treason, broke the shackles of the bondman, and 
made our country first among the nations. 



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